Recently Mentioned Books

1. Alex Niven, The North Will Rise Again: In Search of the Future in Northern Heartlands .  If you can look past the usual ill-informed chatter about Maggie ruining northern England (the author needs to study growth models!), this is quite an interesting book.  I do not mind that it roams into the territory of popular music in what seems to be an arbitrary fashion.  Here is one bit: “I have written before about how a version of this cultural complex is one of the reasons why English identity — w...

Manu S. Pillai, Gods, Guns and Missionaries: The Making of the Modern Hindu Identity .  It may be fruitless to argue about this topic on-line, but almost all Westerners under-read when the topic is Hinduism.

Anthony Trollope, Phineas Finn .  One of the best Trollope novels it seems, even though it is not (yet?) clear what the plot actually consists of. Currency decimalization is also one of the side plots , who can argue with that?

J.P. Mallory, The Indo-Europeans Rediscovered: How a Scientific Revolution is Rewriting Their Story .  The best book I know of on the origins and unities of Indo-European languages.  I had not known Edward Sapir was born in Pomerania.  And “…the Keres people who occupy seven pueblos (villages) in New Mexico speak a language totally unrelated to any of their neighbours and their origins have been frequently disputed.”

Jacqueline Harpman, I Who Never Known Men .  I enjoyed this novel: “Deep Underground, thirty-nine women live imprisoned in a cage.  Watched over by guards, the women have no memory of how they got there, no notion of time, and only a vague recollection of their lives before.”

Francesca Wade, Gertrude Stein: An Afterlife .  One of the best-written biographies I have read in years.  I would not say it is close to my core interests, but if you think you might like it you will.

Yes, I am doing another Conversation with him, in honor of the paperback edition of his highly engaging book On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything .  Here is the last installment of a CWT with Nate , here was my first Conversation with Nate .

This is an unofficial, non-commercial translation of Morris Chang’s memoir , shared for educational and entertainment purposes only. Full disclaimer below.

That bit is from Julian Jackson, A Certain Idea of France: The Life of Charles de Gaulle , a good book.

Eventually I wrote a whole book on the economy and polity of Oapan, and on the lives of the amate painters.  It was published with the University of Michigan Press under the title Markets and Cultural Voices: Liberty vs. Power in the Lives of the Mexican Amate Painters .  It has sold the least well of any of my books, by far, but it is one of my favorites and it is quite unlike all the others.

By Joseph Torigian, this could easily end up as one of the twenty or thirty best biographies of all time.  It is about Chinese history, and is a biography’s of Xi’s father.  The subtitle is The Life of Xi Zhongxun, Father of Xi Jinping .  The dense (and fascinating) exposition is difficult to excerpt, but here is one bit of overview:

That is the new book by John H. Cochrane, Luis Garicano, and Klaus Masuch, and the subtitle is Challenges, Evolution, and Future of the Euro .  Excerpt:

That is from Keach Hagey’s The Optimist: Sam Altman, OpenAI, and the Race to Invent the Future , which I very much enjoyed.  I am not sure Robin’s supply of parties has been increasing out here in northern Virginia…

I will not soon have time to get to Joseph Torigian, The Party’s Interests Come First: The Life of Xi Zhongxun, Father of Xi Jinping , but it looks excellent.

5. Tom Arnold-Foster, Walter Lippmann: An Intellectual Biography .  With so many forms of liberalism in semi-collapse, Lippmann is suddenly relevant again.  He had faith in experts, and also was not crazy.  But somehow is not deep enough to hold my interest?  Still, this book is very well done.

4. Renaud Camus, Enemy of the Disaster: Selected Political Writings .  Interesting enough, and if you can read the French lefties why not this guy too?  That said, he could be more specific on “the Great Replacement.”  The most likely scenario is a France that is about twenty percent Muslim, wracked with periodic ethnic issues, but doing more or less OK.  In any case you should not be afraid to read this book, even though for a while it was considered cancel-worthy .

3. Philip Shenon, Jesus Wept: Seven Popes and the Battle for the Soul of the Catholic Church .  A very well-written and useful book, I cannot say I have a stance on the issues per se .  It is one of my defects that I cannot care enough about the politics of the Catholic Church — I feel there are already too many separate countries with their own politics.  Nor do I feel close to either “the liberals” or “the conservatives” in this debate.  I do think the current American Pope — who seems “pilled...

2. Futurism & Europe: The Aesthetics of a New World , Fabio Benzi and various editors.  “By their aesthetics ye shall know them!”  What were the aesthetics of the futurist movement in the early 20th century?  Should we approve of those aesthetics?  This book is a good starting point for asking that question.  Nice color plates.

1. Eric Ambler, Cause for Alarm .  Are all his books so good?  So far yes.  With very simple means he redefines what it means to be a good writer of thrillers.  Very English, written and set in Italy 1937, with a foolish Englishman who could be out of a Hitchcock movie.  They still called it Laibach back then, the menace of the pending war casts the proper shadow over the whole novel.

6. Lamorna Ash, Don’t Forget We’re Here Forever: A New Generation’s Search for Religion , coming out in July.

That is an excerpt from Donald S. Lopez, Jr. Buddhism: A Journey through History , an excellent book.  Maybe the best book on the history of Buddhism I have read?  And one of the very best books of this year.

There is a new book by Tom S. Clark, Adam N. Glynn, and Michael Leo Owens, called Deadly Force: Police Shootings in Urban America .  Here are a few of the conclusions:

You can buy it here on Amazon .

Recommended.  And I am happy to also recommend Ken’s new book Our Dollar, Your Problem: An Insider’s View of Seven Turbulent Decades of Global Finance, and the Road Ahead .

I very much liked her book Nuclear War: A Scenario .  Do read the Wikipedia entry for a full look at what she has written.  So what should I ask her?